Wind Cries Mary
by xEurydicex
Summary: In the future, she would be the wife of George Darling, but for now, she's an ordinary girl with an extraordinary friend who has run away and is begging her to come with him... STRICT reviews needed!
1. Prologue

What a strange child he was! Tall, slender, with wild hair the color of autumn and beautiful green eyes the color of spring, full of mischief and wonder. He came to my mother's house from distant relatives on my father's side. They had died and left their inheritance to a friend, but their child to my parents. He was but one then, and I a few months younger than that.

We were friends from the very start. In our child- like way, we babbled as babies do in words incoherent to an adult's ears. Adults, we realized quickly, can be so very deaf.

Because of him, I learned to walk months before I probably should have. In fact, my slow development as an infant had my doctors worried, but when he came, that soon changed. I remember that a short time after his arrival, he pulled me up by my hands with an unusual amount of strength and walked backwards, which, in turn, forced me to walk forward. He then let go, beckoning me to walk on my own, but was soon stopped by my nurse, Fanny. She was completely shocked that Peter had pulled me up like that and scooped me up in her arms, failing to realize I had just taken my first steps. Adults, you see, are so very blind.

Blindness and deafness aside, my mother, the very kind Lady Charlotte Kenneth, adored him, as did my father, Lord Edward. While they never quite loved him, much less understood him, as I did, they treated him as if he was their own son, and not the offspring of some distant relative they knew nothing about. They really were wonderful parents. He just failed to realize it. Or perhaps he did, but did not care. He never loved him as I loved them, never thought of them as parents, and never thought of me as a sister, though it was I that he cared for above everyone else.

He taught me everything, and he was everything to me. He was Peter Pan.


	2. Chapter One Growing Up with Peter

Life for a baby is fascinating. Since babies have limited vision at first, things begin to come into focus more and more every day and where there was once a blurry dot against an indigo sky, there is a bird. With Peter, things were also adventurous. Where there was once a little pond in the park, there was a lagoon with mermaids, brightly colored flowers, and a dangerous crocodile, and the willow tree next to the pond was a teepee with Indian warriors chasing after us, trying to capture us (but it was only a game, they always let us go afterwards). Where there was once a chest of toys, there was a pirate ship, with he as captain and I as first mate. I could almost feel the salty sea air and hear the crash of the waves against the ship when we played this game, and I had not once seen the sea. And when I did, a year or so later, it was a disappointment. It paled in comparison to the sea of my and Peter's mind, which somehow seemed... well, a little more than that.

Before he came, I was afraid of everything, but his being fearless and my desire not to be left out of his games changed that. He climbed trees like a circus monkey from a very early age, much to Fanny's despair. She despaired even more when she found that he had taught me to climb them, too. We were quite a handful for one nurse! We escaped from her during outings at the park, and hid from her in the garden among the shrubbery, babbling to each other to remain quiet, lest she heard us. Once she found us, we'd run off in opposite directions, hiding from her again and again.

My mother loved to watch this game. One day she sighed, a little sadly, saying to Fanny:

"My, they grow up so quickly! Before I know it, Peter will be a gentleman and Mary a lady!"

This statement would change my life later, but as I did not even know what a "gentleman" or a "lady" was, Peter and I ignored it at the time. We were, after all, twelve and fourteen months. Our vocabulary was very limited, but in a way, not limited enough.

Peter and I were eating a chocolate cake one day, or rather, Fanny was trying to feed it to us, but we would grab the cake off of the fork and stuff it into each other's faces. We soon grew bored of this game, and so Peter kicked the fork out of our poor nurse's hand, and while she scrambled to get it, said, "Eat your cake!" in a perfect imitation of Fanny's exasperated, scolding voice, shoving another bite into my mouth.

I giggled and did the same to Peter, expecting Fanny to stop us at any time. Instead, a delighted expression came over her face and she rushed out of the room. When she returned, my mother was with her.

"Hear that? What they're saying?" Fanny exclaimed.

"Their first words! How sweet! Though, I'm a bit concerned- they've barely begun to say 'mummy' or 'pappa' yet. Oh well. Thank you for telling me, Fanny. I must get back to tea with Lady Metcalfe."

When my mother left, Peter and I were in stunned silence. We didn't talk until we were put down for our afternoon naps.

"All this time, they've never been able to understand what we've been saying, and now..." Peter drifted off as a new thought entered his mind. "Mary, do you think we're turning into them?"

"Into what?"

"Grown ups!" he cried.

"No!" I said, horrified. "We won't!" But then I remembered my mother's words: I My, they grow up so quickly... /I 

I stood proudly on the bow of my pirate ship, scanning the skies and the waters for my enemy, but he was nowhere to be found. Did he retreat back to the island? No, he was no coward... he would not dare do such a thing when he knew I would be searching for him...

"Have at thee, Captain Crook!"

The voice took me by surprise, but I knew who it was at once.

"Peter Pan!" I growled, drawing my sword. "Prepare to meet thy doom!"

Our swords clashed, and though he was a skillful swordsman, I was unafraid. He would be no match for me. Perry, jab, parry, I thrust! /I I lunged at him with my sword, using all of my might, but was disarmed. I fell to the ground, his sword held to my neck.

"The day is mine!" he cried victoriously. And giggled.

I giggled back, as Peter helped me to my feet. We giggled even more when we saw the mess we had made, both of us imagining the expression Fanny would have on her face when she came in to check on us. The nursery was in complete disarray with blankets and sheets hung from our four poster beds to be sails for my pirate ship, the I Jolly Roger /I .

Sure enough, when she walked in about a minute later, she screamed agitatedly and sent us outside, where my mother was relaxing with a book. When we came out, she picked me up in her right arm, Peter in her left, and walked over to a tree where, on a low branch, laid a bird's nest. Two little eggs cozily sat inside. My mother explained that in only a few weeks those eggs would hatch, and out would come baby birds that would turn into bluebirds. We were both baffled- how could a bird fit into something that small? But we would soon find out.

A week or so later, Peter and I had been playing in the garden, sword fighting with sticks, when half of a light blue eggshell fell to the ground. We looked up to the nest above our heads, but though we could hear a few little peeps we could see nothing. Immediately we begged Fanny to lift us up so we could see, but she was tired, and let us into the house to beg my father (mother was calling on a friend). He was at his desk with a quill pen and parchment, scribbling away at who knows what.

"Pappa! Pappa!" I cried, tugging at his coat, "Baby birds!"

"Not now, Mary, dear," he replied in a distracted manner. "I'm very busy."

"Pappa!" Peter demanded his attention.

"Fanny, get these children out of here, I'm working!" Pappa called. "Sorry, sweet ones," he said to us, kissing us each on the head. "I must work now, maybe later."

We were shooed out of the room by our nurse and sent back outside, each of us frustrated at my father's words.

"All he does is work!" Peter grumbled. "He never does anything else. Just work."

"That's what grown-ups do, Peter. I don't suppose he has a choice," I sighed. "You'd think he'd spare just one moment, though. Oh... let's forget all of this now, and just ask mother to show us the birds later."

Peter consented to forget, but I knew he did not, for he did not put as much heart into our game for the rest of the evening.

The next day, my mother and nurse lifted us up to see the two little birds. They were remarkably unsightly, but Peter and I loved them immediately. Mother told us to name them, and Peter went first (picking, of course, the loveliest of the two ugly creatures for himself), naming his Pirate. I was a little less creative than he, and named mine Mary, as I named all of my dolls. We watched these birds as if we were there own parents, digging up worms for their food and leaving them under the nest for their mother to collect. Most of the time, Peter was better at digging up worms than I was, and so therefore took nearly all of the credit for feeding his bird, making it seem as if I had done nothing, but such was Peter's character and I just accepted it as an endearing trait.

Of course, it didn't help when Pirate ended up being the strongest and fastest of the two birds, and the first to fly. No surprise there.

Peter watched my father as closely as he watched his little Pirate. He listened carefully to everything my father talked about-

"He only talks about his work," Peter often said, disgustedly.

-and paid attention to everything my father did-

"Goes to work, comes home, works more at home, and never once does he I play! /I !"

While I tried to explain to Peter that's just all grown-ups did, and my father seemed happy enough, he would never accept that.

"I don't think I ever want to become a grown-up," Peter said one evening as we were crawling into our beds, in a very decided manner. I had long since accepted the fact that we were growing up, whether we liked it or not, and tried to explain my opinions to Peter, but he was very unequivocally against them, and one thing was to come that would seal this opinion of his indefinitely.


	3. Chapter Two A Total Failure

I was a beautiful fairy, floating from flower to flower, dancing among the fallen leaves of the early autumn, picking the last flowers of the late summer to wear as a crown on my head, happily flitting about a lovely forest without a care in the world...

"Mary," someone said.

What's this? A mere mortal dares interrupt my contentedness?

"Mary!" the voice grew more demanding.

"What is it, mortal?" I asked, still dancing.

"Now isn't the time for that, Mary," the voice was impatient now.

"Oh, all right, what do you want, Peter?" I asked, a little irritated that my game was disrupt.

"Look." He held out his palms, and inside was his little bird- Pirate. It lay motionless, its eyes closed, resting in Peter's hands.

"So what? He's sleeping. Everything and everyone sleeps," I shrugged, wanting to get back to my game.

"I don't think he's sleeping. When we sleep, don't we breathe?"

"How would I know? I'm never awake to find out."

"I'm going to ask your mother. Will you come with me?"

I Will you come with me? /I was a command rather than a question. Peter rarely asked me questions, because he seemed to know everything. He patted the little bird on its head and we walked inside to find my mother, who was having tea with a friend. We made it into the parlor without Fanny stopping us (it was lucky that we had left the garden quietly enough that she didn't wake up from her lawn chair to stop us from going inside). When Peter saw her, he dumped the bird on her lap. I could tell my mother was about to scream, but she saved herself the indignity upon noticing the innocent, pleading look in Peter's compelling emerald eyes.

"What's happened to Pirate?" he asked.

"Oh, my darling," Mother said sympathetically, "I'm afraid your little bird has died."

"What does that mean?"

"Well, dearest," she paused, shooting a sad, but amused glance towards her friend, who smiled sympathetically back. "It means that... hmm, how do I say this? He's no longer alive. He has gone to be with God in Heaven. He'll be quite safe there, quite happy."

"Is he hurt? Will he be okay?"

"No, Peter. I'm afraid he will not be okay. Dying is something that happens when we get to ill, or too old. He cannot do anything on this earth anymore, like fly or play or sing, but in Heaven with God, he can do whatever he wants to do. Don't be sad for Pirate, love. He is very happy."

Peter became very quiet at this. Mother sent both of us away, and had a servant take the bird from her. He stalked away from the parlor, an indescribable expression on his face that had me worried. I could always tell what he was feeling. I ran after him, following him to the staircase.

"Peter, what's wrong?" I asked.

He answered simply: "Mary, I am never, never going to grow up." And with that, he went upstairs, leaving me alone.

Soon, it was Peter's third birthday. He loved his first and second birthday, but somewhere between his second and third birthdays he realized that birthdays were a celebration of growing one year older, so this year he came up with a very clever plan: he wouldn't have a birthday. If he didn't want to turn three, why should he? I thought it ingenious of him. The logic, to me, made perfect sense. Why should he turn three? Why should I, in two months? We wouldn't, so we shouldn't, so there.

That entire day, he strutted around with the cockiest grin on his face, crowing to himself and to me about how very clever he was. I, of course, was used to his cocky attitude, and was enamored with his plan, so I didn't mind his attitude a bit. I was looking forward to what the grown ups would think that night, when they had set out Peter's cake and presents, when Peter didn't turn three as they expected him to! Wouldn't it be such a fine joke? I could hardly wait until that evening.

The evening came, and my parents and nurse sang "For He's a Jolly Good Fellow", bringing out Peter's cake, which was eloquently decorated with his name in fancy script, and little candy flowers. It looked scrumptious, and had me wondering if one could still remain two and eat his or her three-year-old birthday cake. I decided that one could.

"Three years old! You're such a big boy now, Peter!" my mother crooned.

"Turning into a fine young gentleman," my father said proudly of his adopted son. "How does it feel to be three?"

"I'm not three," Peter said simply, that cocky smile playing upon his lips.

"But of course you are!" mother laughed. "Aren't you excited?"

"No. I don't want to be three!" he said, more forcefully. "I'll be two forever and ever."

It went on like this for a few minutes, until my father said the curséd words:

"Peter, you can't receive the presents we've bought you until you turn three!"

He laughed and smiled as he said it, as if it were some big joke, Peter's refusing to age. I gasped, quietly enough so nobody heard me, but I know I must have been gaping like a codfish, waiting in anticipation for Peter's response. I could see the turmoil on his face as he tried to decide between staying two, or presents, staying two, or presents. He wiped the sweat off of his brow and-

He conceded. He ate his cake, he received his presents. He was a-

"Failure! I'm a total failure!" he grumbled that night as we went to bed, struggling to put one of my doll's aprons over his new stuffed bear's eye. "A total failure," he repeated, trying to hide his satisfaction at turning his birthday present into a pirate. "A total... (yawn)... failure..." he said, falling asleep with the bear under his arm. I sighed, falling asleep as well, wishing fretfully that it wasn't the very best apron of my dolls' that he had picked for his new bear's eye patch...

That night, Peter had a terrible nightmare. I woke up to him screaming, tears streaming down his face, and quickly rushed to his side, cradling him in my arms like a baby. Fanny rushed into our room, but saw that he was calming down with me crooning to him to quiet down. Smiling to herself, she walked out. I believe she found it sweet that I, a mere two-year-old girl, could calm Peter and make him forget his nightmare, but I knew this wasn't an ordinary nightmare of monsters in the closet. He always slaughtered the monsters in his closet. I know, because he was sleep walking once and thought he saw one and ripped apart a favorite gown of mine that had been sticking out of the wardrobe. He wasn't afraid of monsters.

"Mum..." he cried, softly, his sobs gradually relinquishing. He wasn't talking about my mother, I don't think, because he never referred to her using her "name". He was dreaming about his mother. His real mother.


	4. Chapter Three Scarred

"Peter, do you remember last night, when you had that dream?" I asked him after breakfast. He batted his eyelashes a few times, as if he had something caught in his eye.

"No."

Liar. I wanted to confront him, such was my curiosity as to what he had been dreaming about, but I knew he would not tell me anything, and I didn't want to trouble him any more than I had to. I decided diverting him with a game of pirate would be the best way to get both of our minds off of his nightmare. This time, he insisted being dread pirate Captain Crook. Usually he wanted to be the one _killing_ Captain Crook.

"Thou shall never catch me!" I giggled, running away and hiding from Peter in the garden. He stalked around, searching for me.

"I know you're here somewhere. Mark my words, I'll find ye yet!" he growled in a perfect pirate voice, pushing through the shrubbery with his sword. I waited in anticipation; hand on my weapon, ready for anything.

"ARRRR!" Captain Crook growled. I screamed and ran out of the garden. How did he sneak up on me like that?

"Prepare to die!" I cried, and we clashed swords. We fought for some time, until my father saw us and took the sticks out of our hands and set us apart.

"That's dangerous, children, do not play with sticks like that!" he reprimanded gently. We pouted at him, but he just smiled. It was hard to be angry with him when he smiled like that, because we know that he doesn't know we're smart enough not to hurt ourselves. And if we did get hurt, it'd be even _more_ fun! Nothing was as prestigious as a battle scar. Oh well. He's just trying to protect us.

Apparently, Peter didn't share my positive attitude about the situation, for he moped about for some time, grumbling something about grown-ups spoiling the game, and never letting us have any fun, and never having any fun _themselves_. This seemed to be true, for while my mother and father always smiled when they were around each other, they were always _talking_, but I figured that was how they liked to be. Peter did not accept this.

We begged to be let inside so we could go to our nursery and play pirate without our parents making us stop. We skipped the beginning bit and jumped to the part where we begin sword fighting. Peter brandished his sword and clashed it against mine with a force that was almost frightening, like he was really fighting me. I'm not nearly as physically strong as he is, and tried to fight back, but it wasn't long before he accidentally scraped my arm with his sword, penetrating the skin and causing it to bleed. Startled, I fell backwards and cried out, my eyes tearing up.

Immediately my nurse, who had apparently been washing clothes, judging from the amount of soapsuds caught in her wispy hair, rushed in and helped me up.

"What's happened, dear? Ooh, poor Mary, look at that nasty cut! How did that- oh, I see now. Peter, put that twig back outside where it belongs! Don't you see that you've hurt Mary?"

I sniveled. Peter scowled at me. Was he not the least bit sorry? Fanny took me away to get my arm bandaged, and when we came back, she noticed something sticking out of my wardrobe.

"A stick! Mary, I have told you time and time again that these are not to be allowed in your wardrobe, to soil all of your pretty clothes, or in this house at all! You must stay in your room until tomorrow morning as punishment."

"But Fanny!" I protested. The sun had not yet begun setting. I had wanted to go back outside to play after dinner, but _someone_ had framed me. Fanny walked out of the nursery, and my pleading expression turned to one of contempt- for Peter. But he was nowhere to be found. Most likely, he was outside. Enjoying the warmth of the sunlight. Without me.

I listened to his steps from under my bed covers as he came into the nursery for the night. Rather than being light patters, they were vicious stomps. Something was bothering him, but I was cross with him so I didn't stir and pretended I was asleep. I heard him utter a heavy sigh as he realized I was pretending to sleep. If I were awake or asleep, he would talk to me, but if I were fake sleeping, he wouldn't bother me, seeing as that meant I did not want anyone to talk to me. With another, heavier sigh, he flopped onto his bed, but even a few minutes later I did not hear that soft, rhythmic breathing that signified sleep. He always fell asleep immediately. Something was bothering him. Soon, I heard his feet padding lightly across the wooden floor to my side of the nursery.

As softly as a cat, he leapt onto the side of my bed and whispered, "Faker," into where he guessed my ear was. I pulled the covers tighter around myself, not wanting to talk to him.

"Listen, Mary," he said. "I'm sorry about putting my sword in your wardrobe for Fanny to find, and I'm sorry about hurting your arm like that. Is it bad?"

"Yes. Very bad." It was a nasty gash, but the pain was over now, so I was exaggerating. A little.

"I didn't mean to hit it so hard... I'm so sorry."

"You meant to hit it at all?" I cried, sitting up.

"Yes, but not actually scratch it like that!"

"Peter! How wretched! Why?"

"The make believe felt so real, and I wasn't very happy at the time, so I guess I just got carried away. I meant to hit you, but not really _you_, if you know what I mean."

"Why did you put the sword in my wardrobe so I'd get in trouble?" I asked.

"My wardrobe didn't have any room, and I was too lazy to take it outside."

"But you went outside right after!"

"Yeah, but I didn't now I was going to go outside right after that at the time," he replied as if it were a perfectly rational explanation for getting me in trouble. He smiled his plea for forgiveness- his lower lip pouting just slightly and his eyes large and shining. I only let him believe that it worked on me. The truth was, I forgave him before he apologized, but I always felt that was wrong so I never admitted to that.

Peter saw the change in my face that signaled that he was completely forgiven, and his smile faded. "Mary, something is-"

"Bothering you. What is it?"

"I heard your father talking about school."

"School?"

"For boys."

"For boys?"

"Echo... echo..."

"Do shut up. Tell me more."

"Mary, he was talking about sending me to a school for boys."

"So? Everyone has to go to school."

"For boys, Mary! Meaning that I would be going away, and leaving you here! Not just a local school, a boarding school, where I would go away forever and ever and hardly ever see you. It wouldn't be when we first start school, but sometime later on. I don't want to leave you."

"Our parents wouldn't be so mean! They wouldn't separate us."

Peter shrugged, sighed, and crawled back into his own bed, and soon I heard the musically rhythmic breathing that indicated he had fallen asleep, and soon it lulled me to sleep as well.


	5. Chapter Four I Will Not Grow Up!

_Note from the author: Ok, so I've been proofing all of the other chapters and have found some things that simply need to be changed. They haven't been changed yet, but I will edit things such as how Peter came to Mary's family in the first place and more. I'll keep you posted when I've made changes on the other chapters as I add more to Thanks for all of your comments in my e-mail and on this website. They really, sincerely help! _

Peter and I were growing up, whether we liked it or not. Of course, we were each only five years old, so we weren't quite there, but when a child turns five it's almost as if they've reached a turning point. Their speech is more developed and they are starting to look like children rather than babies. I myself had grown an impressive head of brown hair that never quite stayed as combed as it should, though Peter's was easily tamed against his will by our nurse, who kept it short enough that if he tried to mess it up it still wouldn't look that bad.

Peter truly tried everything in his power to keep himself from aging, but I think either he gave up or just relented. Being bigger wasn't so terribly bad. He was capable of doing more things, but with each positive aspect of growing up was a new responsibility he had to deal with. Fanny had been instructed to educate us a little bit before we went to grammar school, which would start when we turn six, but he refused to cooperate in the learning process. If he learned to read and write, he would have to grow up and work in an office someday. If he didn't learn, how could he grow up and work in an office? It was a perfect line of reasoning.

But this plan started to fail, as all of his attempts at ceasing his growth did. Little did I know that some day soon he would find the way, much to my horror. I had begun to believe that growing up wasn't as bad as he made it out to be. I loved learning the alphabet and how to read music, loved being able to do something he could not. Even this didn't motivate him to learn and grow. My parents could not understand him, but they weren't worried and figured he was just a "slow learner". This thought of theirs was a great blow to Peter's pride, I could tell, but he never let it show. I truly admired his perseverance through all of this, though his behavior grew more and more strange as time went on.

I had been sleeping soundly one night when suddenly, I awoke. I turned to look at the bed across from mine, but it was empty. The nursery window was open, and Peter was standing at it, staring at something very particular but as I drew nearer to him, I could not figure out what it was. All I saw was the street below, the tops of houses, and the clear night sky above. As a shooting star shot across the sky, Peter sighed. It was the sigh of one who has made a wish, or prayed a prayer, so many times that they have given up hope it will ever be answered.

"It's cold, Peter, why don't you go back to sleep?" I asked. He seemed startled. Apparently, he hadn't realized I was there. Usually he could hear my footsteps approaching no matter how quiet I was and would acknowledge my presence, but something else was occupying his mind.

"I'm not sleepy," he said, his eyelashes fluttering a little. His nose wrinkled from the failed attempt to stifle a yawn. "I'm sorry I woke you up. I was trying to be as quiet as possible."

"It's all right. How long have you been here?"

"Not long."

"What's bothering you?"

I received a reply of silence.

"Peter..."

"I was just thinking."

I knew I wouldn't get a better reply, so I went back to bed, but was not able to sleep.

Over the next year, I woke up many times during the middle of the night because of Peter standing at that window; watching, waiting. But for what? He wouldn't tell me anything. Before, it didn't matter what it was, he would tell me everything, but perhaps even he didn't know the answer to my questions.

For at least the first couple of years of our education, we would be going to the same school with some of the other children in our neighborhood. He was very upset at the prospect of going to school, and he was... dare I say it? Frightened. My parents and nurse did everything in their power to stir excitement in his heart for the next stage in his life, but he refused to look forward to it at all.

"Mother," he said the night before we were to start school, "what will I learn when I go to school?"

Mother had a pained expression on her face, knowing that anything she said would be wrong, but she mustered her courage and answered him. "Well, darling, you will learn arithmetic, to read, write, speak different languages, and all sorts of things!"

"Why should I know them?"

"So you may be educated, dear."

"I _know_, but _why_?" he demanded, growing impatient.

"When you become a man, you'll need to get a job to support your family. You must have a job that is good enough to feed and clothe them, and let them live a comfortable life."

"What if I don't want a family?"

Mother laughed, glancing at my father who was reading a book by the fire. "Trust me darling, you will. Having a family is the greatest pleasure in my life."

"What if I'm not good enough to get a job to support my family?"

"You should get a job before you start a family, Peter. But why all of these questions now? You won't have to worry about these things for at least another fourteen years, maybe even more!"

"Fourteen years is a long time," I commented. "I remember you saying that we grow up so quickly, Mother."

"Oh, dearest, you do! Why, just look at the photographs of you that we have from only a year ago!"

Peter's and my gaze turned to the mantel, where there was a picture of us on my fifth birthday. We had, indeed, changed quite a bit. Peter's face fell.

"Maybe fourteen years isn't as long as it sounds. We are growing up so quickly, Mary," Peter said that night, as we were getting ready for bed.

"Then we must make the most of it," I said, picking up the clothes he had tossed on the floor and folding them. "Just go to bed, Peter. Get some rest. We have a big day tomorrow."

"Mary, I'm not going."

"Peter."

"I'm not!" He paused and began to say something, but hesitated, a nervous expression on his face. After what seemed like great deliberation happening in his mind, he said, "Let's run away, Mary. Let's run away so we will not have to go to school, and so we will not grow up."

I couldn't believe it, but he was serious. He sincerely wanted to carry on with this extraordinary plan.

"Think of it, Mary. It'd be the greatest adventure! Who knows what we would be facing? We could go anywhere and do anything we ever wanted to do. Please say yes!" He had me by the shoulders; the most fervent and desperate look in his eyes.

I shook my head. "Oh, Peter, you know I couldn't. I could never leave Mother like that! Peter, we can get through this together. Don't be frightened."

"I'm not frightened!" he said defensively. He paused, a look of stubborn determination on his face. "Well, then, if you're not going to run away, I will.

I just shook my head. He had a stubborn, petty nature, but it would pass. It always did, but now it had started to take its toll on me. Peter was never afraid of anything, and he was afraid of _school_? I pretended to be much more confidant than I really was. After one last, hopeless attempt to sway him, I bade him good night and went to bed, but didn't fall asleep until Peter did. He breathed, slow and rhythmically, but uneasily. Even in his breath I could detect restlessness, discontent, but it soon lulled me to sleep.

In the middle of the night I awoke. Something was wrong. I turned and looked at Peter's bed, but the covers were too jumbled for me to tell if he were there. I got up, felt around his bed to see if I could find him in the cluttered mass of pillows and blankets, and seeing that he wasn't in bed, I ran to the window. But he was nowhere to be found.

Since then, I have not been able to sleep with my window shut, and I haven't once. Peter ran away and took my lullaby with him, and I have nothing but the wind's breath to sing me to sleep.


	6. Chapter Five She'll Leave You, Too

_Note from the author: I'm taking out the part I wrote earlier about Peter being afraid of death. I had an idea of how to work that into the story, but I've decided to discard that idea. It hasn't been changed yet, but I'll keep you posted on when it is. By the way, there is a little bit of a story, more of a paraphrase, really, that I intend to write someday, or, rewrite, rather. It's about Rapunzel. I think I'll replace the bit about Rapunzel in this chapter with another story, eventually. I hope you enjoy this chapter. It's definitely a turning point in the story!_

"Can I see him?" I asked excitedly. "What's his name?"

"Slow down, dear! You'll get to see him soon enough!" but I could tell my father was excited as well. Finally, the midwife brought the beautiful baby boy from my mother's room and placed him in my father's arms.

"What shall we name him?" I asked again.

My father smiled into the eyes of his new son. "Your mother and I decided that if we would have a boy, his name would be Jackson, after my father. Would you like to hold him?"

I took my new brother in my arms and found it hard to believe how tiny he was. Certainly I had never been so small- I was quite tall for my age nowadays, and was growing all the time, though I thought quite awkwardly. I had a mound of tangled, mousy-brown hair tumbling down my back, knobby knees, and eyes too large for my face, but my mother said she looked the same way when she was my age. I find that hard to believe, for she is so beautiful and I can't imagine her any other way.

In time, I learned that my brother served me a great purpose- for telling stories to. I had the wildest imagination, which my parents often said I got carried away with. I tried sharing the stories I wrote down, and the ones straight out of my head, with them, but they always sent me to study for school, to fill my head with numbers and reason, calling my stories "rubbish". Jackson provided a non-critical, and somewhat attentive audience, especially if I used stuffed animals as characters in my charades. I knew he didn't understand anything that I told him- he was, after all, an infant- but making him laugh was a great delight. Jackson was just what I needed in my life to inspire me, to free my imagination. I could have always told my stories to myself, of course, but this did not have the same effect as having an audience did. But little did I know that I had more of an audience than what I saw before my eyes.

Jackson was born on May 15, and I only had a couple of short months to enjoy with him before my parents were to send me to Madame Severnea's Finishing School for Girls, very far away in Newcastle. I had heard dreadful things about the place, that it was more of a prison for girls than a school, but my parents insisted that I go to become a more refined individual. Refined like iron. The matter was very distressing to me, as I was very afraid of the school. The headmistress was said to have wrapped the knuckles of girls who have committed offenses such as a bow not being tied perfectly straight or handwriting on a composition not being perfectly tidy. I would walk in a girl, and come out forgetting I was ever a child.

As I had a short time left to create stories, I told a different story to Jack every night before he went to bed, though pretended to be practicing Latin when my parents came in to see what I was doing. On the last night before I was to depart for Madame Severnea's, I decided to finish performing my last tale.

"Rapunzel grew tired of waiting for the prince to find his way to her tower, and so when the witch came for her diner dishes, she kept the knife, hiding it in her pocket. When the witch left to go to town that day, Rapunzel began sawing at her hair, trying to cut it. She sawed with all of her strength for hours and hours, until the braid was a pile on the floor. She tied one end to her table leg and dropped the rest over her window and climbed down, to find her prince in a battle with the evil witch. The witch heard her coming, and without blinking an eye she turned herself into an identical for of the prince so that Rapunzel did not know who to help"

My brother was now asleep, and upon seeing my lack of audience, I stopped the story and kissed him on the head, and covered him up with an extra blanket, as the wind might be cold once I opened the window before I went to bed. I don't even remember the reason that I sleep with the window open; I just know that every time I shut it at night, I am unable to sleep. Even after I fall asleep and my nurse comes in and shuts it I immediately wake up. Even when it's open, I have a hard time sleeping, and the strangest dreams fill my head that make me wake up in a cold sweat, shivering and frightened. But I never remember why.

I slipped under my covers, and suddenly the realization that this would be the last time I would be in my own bed for a very long time punched me in the stomach. I wept bitterly for what seemed like an hour, soaking my pillow in tears. Something leapt onto my bed, very softly, and I assumed it was my Persian feline Geraldine come to comfort me, but as I pulled the covers away from my head, I was staring not into the blue eyes of a cat, but the blue eyes of a _boy_. I was far too frightened to scream, and instead spoke in a hoarse whisper.

"Who are you?"

The boy, whose face was illuminated by moonlight, grinned impishly, and stood up on my bed, bowing regally. "I am Peter. Peter Pan."

Old and dusty memories, packed away in boxes, were released and came rushing at my head like a flood. I knew that name. _I knew that name! _Oh, where had I heard it before? I sniveled and wiped away the last of my tears, concentrating hard on why this name meant to much to meâ And then I remembered.

"No!" I nearly screamed loudly enough to wake up Jack. "No! You cannot be! You aren't anything but an apparition, please go away and leave me alone!" The tears came again, and I buried my face in my pillow. A moment later, I lifted my head again, but the vision of the boy had not disappeared. The grin had been wiped off of his face and he looked at me in confusion.

"Lady, why are you crying?" he asked.

I didn't answer but instead rambled, "Why are you here? Are you a ghost? You can't beâ Peter would have been younger than thatâ please, go away!"

"I am here seeking Mary Kenneth. Do you know her? I think she lives here. I may have the wrong window, but this one was the only window open so I thought it must be hers" he gazed about the room, and his eyes landed on Jack's crib. "Is she in there?" No, she was older than that"

"What does she look like?" I asked.

"She's quite small. Smaller than me. Brown hair. Scar on her left arm from when I" he smiled as if recalling a memory. "From when I accidentally cut her with a sword."

I clutched my left arm and rolled up the sleeve of my nightgown. The moonlight revealed a jagged pink scar. I had forgotten where it had come from. If he knew something as minor as that, he must be Peter! I got out of bed and stood on the floor, looking up at the boy standing on my bed. My voice trembling, I whispered, "Peter, I _am_ Mary."

He looked at me disbelievingly, examined the scar, and touched my face. And sighed. "You're so old."

"You're older than I am," I replied. He looked as if I had gravely insulted him, but he nodded. "I am getting older, but it's ok because I can run faster and climb trees better and do much moreâ like" He paused, staring at me with a critical eye.

"Like what?" I asked.

"Oh, Mary, there's so much to tell you! To show you! Mary, you must come away with me." He grasped my hand and pulled me towards the window. I flung it out of his grasp.

"Where do you want to take me?"

"Mary, these past few years have been wonderful. That night, when I left, I was taken away by a fairy- _my_ fairy. You know how fairies are born, right? Every time a baby laughs for the first time, a fairy is born and when I laughed for the first time, my fairy, Tinker Belle, was born. She told me this, that night, and begged me to come and live with her, and that she and I would somehow figure out how to stop me from growing up."

"A fairy? Peter, I'm not sure that I believe in fairies."

"You used to. You used to _be_ one. You used to be so many things. Don't you remember?"

"Peter, that was make-believe! I don't believe in any of that before. Not even in fai-"

He clasped a hand over my mouth. "Never say that you don't believe in fairies. Never. Every time that happens, somewhere a fairy falls down dead!"

"Peter, that was something _we _made up!" I said exasperatedly. "It's just make-believe!"

He eyed me warily. "Mary, make-believe is more real than you or I have ever imagined. Mary, I have been raised by fairies in the time I've been gone. They have taught me to fly. And yesterday, when I was flying, I finally found a place where I can live and never grow up. Never! Mary, you must come with me! You must!" He stamped his foot in exasperation.

"Where have you been living with fairies?"

"Kensington Gardens, of course."

"Peter, Kensington Gardens is where we always pretended the fairies to be"

"And we were right. Where else would they live? Please come with me."

"I can't. I can't leave my parents like that!"

"They'll leave you! They left me, as my real parents before them did."

"They won't. They love me."

"Mary," he sighed, "I have a story to tell you. I remember my mother and father. They played with me every day, and they loved me, but one day they got tired of me. They didn't want to play with me anymore. They left my house, and my nurse took care of me and told me they were never coming back. Then one day, my nurse packed all of my things and put me in a carriage and that was the day I met you. I was happy here, I really was, but Mary, I will not grow up! I want to be a little boy and always have fun! I don't want to have to worry about grown-up things! So I left. And then I came back, but the window was closed."

"Never! Peter, I have slept with that window open every single night!"

"It was closed, I swear. I saw your mother, father, and you inside with a boy. Him." Peter sneered, pointing to the crib where Jack was sleeping. "I was replaced. But I came back one more time, to see if you would come with me to Neverland. I had two mothers, and they both left me. She'd leave you, too, Mary."

I shook my head. "I can't," I said, tears welling up in my eyes.

"Well, then, I must be leaving," he said, in a tart voice that sounded as if I were just someone he had started talking to on the street and was tired of talking to. "I'll come back tomorrow to see if you want to join me. If not, I will probably never see you again. Good bye." He turned to leave, though at that point in time I knew not how he would accomplish that going out the window.

"Peter, wait!" I cried as he did this. His head whipped around. "Peter, you cannot come tomorrow. Tomorrow my mother and father send me away to" I bit my lip as I said the last words, "boarding school."

Peter's blue eyes reflected starlight and glittered. He blew a sparkling powder into my face, and said, "Think of a happy thought." Then, he took my hand, and we flew out of the nursery, out of my house, flying to a place where we would never, never have to worry about grown-up things again


End file.
